I stayed in this roundy cottage in Portmerion and was given a whole lot of stuff to think about

Back from the Clough Ellis vision of Italianate Arcadia, setting for the surreal 1970s spy series, ‘The Prisoner,’ I struggled to synthesise what I heard, present it as a General Theory of Universal Knowledge, flog it to a New Age business publisher, save the planet, buy myself a converted trawler with a bikini bird crew and bother Japanese whalers (with the bikini bird crew pole dancing round the mizzen mast).

Frankly, I was plaiting sawdust until this morning, stuck at the general theory of universal knowledge bit, and not for the first time. The whole save the planet/get some cash/buy a trawler/bother the whalers with pole dancing sirens scheme looked as dead in the water as my chances of becoming foreign policy advisor after telling Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander, another Portmerion guest, that the UN resembled a second rate, more corrupt, version of FIFA. Then I awoke to the epiphany that we are names, not numbers. Every life form on the planet  has a unique individual identity, dignity and purpose. Nature indiscriminately abhors entropy. Humans, the last, lunkheaded twirl of the evolutionary dice, persist in the deadly fallacy that they are above, not a part of, creation. Their high-handed, cack-handed interventions, based on mathematically impossible attempts to exclude uncertainty and randomness from the infinite possibilities afforded by an ever-expanding series of variable circumstances will, by nature, always generate unforeseen, counter-intuitive consequences. The more binary data we collect, the greater the hubristic illusion of control in a quantum universe. We are the deadly meddlers, psychopathic intellectual delinquents with yottabytes of information but no understanding of the tendency of exosystems to deliquesce. Or something along those lines.

Just then another thought hit, me like a great wave biffing a Japanese nuclear plant: ‘Jesus, it’s 8-30 already. I need to walk the whippet. I’ll park this stuff until I’ve seen what the others have written and knock something off tomorrow after I’ve bought a few robots and done Waitrose.’

Firing up my ecologically incorrect 1972 Beetle convertible, partly compensated by its unique interior rainforest microclimate of continual damp and lichens, I was soon yomping round Hampstead Heath, London’s last great wilderness, with no sighting of any other native species apart from George Michael and packs of exotic dogs and their walkers, dressed for the mild weather in North Face Arctic survival parkas. Coffee beaker in one hand, dogpoo bag in the other – careful which one you lift to your lips – I relegated the Mission to Explain to an internal rant about Arsenal’s inability to grasp the essential notion that the purpose of football was not to create the perfect balance sheet but to win the occasional trophy. I was considering whether a latter day Christopher Marlowe would have substituted the tale of Arsene Wenger’s Icarean 49 match unbeaten run followed by six years of no silverware for Tamburlaine the Great when I thought I saw a huge white airbag, bouncing at great speed across the manicured blasted wasteland. As everyone who wasted time in front of the TV in the 1970s instead of revising knows, whenever he tried to escape Portmerion, the Prisoner was engulfed then herded back by a giant chewing gum bubble. The genius of the series was the ambivalence as to whether the village, its inhabitants and the sheepdog bubble itself (called Rover) were real/partially real or whether we were observing the Prisoner’s dream state, induced by his captors to find out how much he knew. Was this why I had been transported to Portmerion?

This will happen if you can't remember what you learned at Portmerion

Hardly. I didn’t put my hand up once to ask a clever question, fearing the bubble would drag me out as soon as I brought tin robots or whippets into the Big Conversation but nobody noticed, much less dragged me off in an airbag. My engulfing bubble on the Heath was the dread of explaining to Julia that despite inviting me to the most stimulating and sometimes surreal weekend I have spent for a very long time, in the company of some of the most stellar minds in this or any other chiliocosm, my tendency for transference activity was once again getting the better of me. For example, revelations from Nassim Taleb that the best laid plans of mice and men always conform to SNAFU were merely reinforcing my resolve to arse around in life and achieve little. My new best friend Sylvia Earle’s plangent exposition of the wanton destruction of our oceans moved me almost to tears but didn’t stop me from discussing 1950s American nudist postcards and the vanishing folk art of ice cream vans when I sat next to the great lady at dinner.

I walked on the beach with Frieda Hughes, daughter of Ted and Sylvia Plath, two of my favourite poets, an original bard herself and a painter of profound physical and psychological depth, discussing big motorbikes (Frieda rides one, in mitigation). At breakfast with Human Rights diva Baroness Helena Kennedy I turned the conversation to Glasgow hardmen. I simply frolicked in the anarchic slipstream of my heroine, Miriam Margolyes. But I was one of the lads, to all intents and purposes. The genius of Portmerion is partly the geniuses but also the Thusness of the whole shebang. We’re all names, not numbers, individuals with collective responsibility to do the best we can. Julia’s genius is her understanding of the palette of personalities.

The overarching message, if there was one, was probably wasted on me, like the time I met the Dalai Lama and spent the few seconds in the presence of a Realised Being wondering if he was wearing a Casio or a Rolex. But if you get the chance, go to the Editorial Intelligence Names Not Numbers Symposium. For a taste of the Portmerion conversation, listen to The Forum on the BBC World Service. Make an effort to see Beeban Kidron’s documentary on the Devadasi. iPod the EI podcasts. Read anything by Frieda Hughes and Sylvia Earle’s ‘The World is Blue.’ Imagine Simon Schama having a bloody good knees up in the bar at 2 am then delivering a multidimensional summary of all the big ideas of the past 2500 years six hours later. Try to understand Nassim Taleb’s Black Swan then imagine he was sitting next to you on the bus, which, by the way, was one of those executive football team coaches with leather seats and a big round sofa at the back with loads of snacks and Sky TV  . . .  Jesus, is that the bubble again? Be seeing you.

John J Kelly

PS. Here’s a handy link to all the videos and podcasts from Portmerion

Actually I quite like smoking and all the things advertised on this poster so it shows how messed up I am and how tricky and pointless it is to pontificate about this sort of malarky.

A couple of posts back Thus got on an uncharacteristically high horse about the dangers of Methadrone. My comments were not based on the government’s (subsequent) decision to ban the Chinese designer drug, but on reports from people I know and respect that it is generally horribly moreish and does one’s head in on an industrial scale. While the same or similar might apply to all sorts of legal highs, including alchohol, Methadrone/Mephedrone is a particularly potent drug.

But there is still no evidence that it kills people, per se. In March, after the death of two teenagers on Humberside, the then government of Gordon Brown jerked its knees and banned the drug, causing the resignation of Professor Nutt (Thus passim) who appears to be a bit of a blowhard but who probably had a point about the government using drugs legislation for political purposes.

A few weeks ago, after the general election, it was (not very widely) reported that Methadrone was not, after all, the root cause of the deaths. Without impugning the intelligence and impartiality of our glorious police force, which we all know is wonderful, the most worrying part about the ‘findings’ is that the police may have confused the word ‘methadrone’ with ‘methadone’ – a heroin substitute which the boys may also have been taking.

Notwithstanding the above, I apologise for straying into the drugs debate. The problem with Methadrone, like Crack, is that it’s far too cheap for the hit it provides. Apparently. But I don’t know what I’m talking about and I’m certain that neither the police nor the government do either.

John J Kelly

Leaving aside their general incompetence, bad advisors, dodgy donors, hooray Henry Metrocentricity and extreme reluctance to clarify, much less detail, any sensible policies, even the New Tories should have been able to savage the field of half-dead sheep that passes for the incumbent UK government. Part of the reason is demographics – Britain’s ‘much-admired’ first past the post voting system has been comprehensively gerrymandered so as to make it very difficult indeed for the party which gets a popular majority to ensure a working majority of seats. This has worked in favour of the Tories in the past, so no sympathy there. To ensure a landslide along the lines of the Labour 1997 victory, the Tories would need to be looking at a 15 point opinion poll lead at this stage. This time last year, it was trending that way. So whatever could be the matter?

It’s the economy, stupid. Or rather, the bubble economy which constitutes the UK public sector. Under New Labour, it now accounts for 6.1 million jobs out of 21.6 million full time workers, representing 28 percent of the UK workforce, the vast majority of which must be assumed to be ‘natural’ Labour voters. In addition, there are 7.1 million part time workers, many of whom either work in the public sector and participate in McJob schemes. That’s not to count the 2.3 million higher education students and 176,000 academics who teach them. The vast majority of these cadres wouldn’t be considered natural Tories. – nor have the Tories given them any reason to change their collective minds – but now they aren’t so sure of their masters’ intentions either. Proposed Labour cuts in the Higher Education budgets will definitely reduce jobs and the number of student places, plus a growing wave of discontent amongst workers in areas of the civil service, Network Rail and (privatised) British Airways, may mean that a significant number will lose faith in the ‘devil you know’ nostrum and punish the incumbents.

Moreover, despite the recession and clear evidence that the sporran is empty, Gordon’s job creation schemes, designed to massage grisly employment figures, have continued apace. Overall unemployment rose by 54,000 in the three months to January 2010, but this was mitigated by 20,000 new jobs in the NHS – 1.3 million employees – alone. Employment in the private sector fell by 61,000 in the last quarter of 2009 alone. Nobody can seriously believe that this version of Maoist economics can lead anywhere but to the IMF.

Voter turnout in the 2001 and 2005 General Elections was 59.4 and 61.4 percent respectively, compared to 77.7 and 71.4 percent in 1992 and 1997. John Major’s Tories won with a vastly-reduced majority in recession conditions mainly because Neil Kinnock’s ‘nearly-new’ Labour failed to convince the electorate that they represented a viable alternative. Five years later, the outgoing Major administration left Tony Blair and Gordon Brown with a budget surplus at a time of unprecedented global economic growth. Having put the budget back on an even keel, Major lost, apparently, because he couldn’t drum up the necessary ‘feelgood factor.’ From 1997-2001, after a four year period of pretending to adhere to the ‘golden mean,’ Gordon set about taxing, spending and consequently wrecking the exchequor just in time for a global economic downturn.

With the stakes as high as they are, I predict that the 2010 percentage voter turnout will be as high as in 1997. It would require epic numbers of turkeys to vote for Christmas for the pink-tinged Cameronites to secure anything like a landslide on a Blairite scale, given that from 2001 to the present time, the much-trumpeted growth in UK jobs has been driven by the public sector, so whatever goes down, we are unlikely to see a landslide. But public sector workers will need to weigh up as to what degree the inevitable budget cuts which will follow the election will be more savage under the Tories than under Labour. Meanwhile, those in the private sector know that taxes will rise whoever sits astride the woolsack. They won’t vote Labour.

So I’ll stick my neck out and say that, despite the unconvincing Tory arguments, most voters are going to wake up on polling day, survey the mess and vote for anyone but Gordon. The Tories will win a reasonable working majority, show their true colours and set about vigorously dismantling New Labour’s constituency, the public sector, partly because of the imperative to reduce the obese deficit and partly because that’s what they are ideologically inclined to do. This will be a shame, since it employs a lot of hardworking people who work for the public good, who deserved better leadership than they got under the Great Helmsman.

Thus the next election, which should be about the environment, sustainability, public sector reform, a fairer society, education, training, infrastructure and health will be won by the Tories on the feelbad factor, and Britain’s half-assed stab at the Middle Way will be history.

John J Kelly

Last October, former NL drug czar, the (perhaps) aptly named Professor David Nutt resigned/was sacked from the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) for stating that so-called Home Secretary Alan Johnson must have been on one if he thought that upgrading cannabis from class C to B was a good trip. I was not surprised when Johnson later confirmed that Prof. Nutt had indeed been sacked, because his ‘advice’ cut across government policy to attack soft targets, such as weed-smoking kids, in order to maintain the pretence that the police, NL’s lard-arsed  political wing, were meeting their targets. Or something like that.

Nutt was sacked for arguing common sense. Alcohol misuse is linked to the overwhelming majority of violent crimes, ditto the number of admissions to hospital accident and emergency departments, breaks up families but is perfectly legal. Weed, and even Ecstasy are far less dangerous. Stoners can’t be arsed to do much more than flop around. Ecstasy becomes dangerous when taken in conjunction with alcohol. Banning one and not the other is a heavy trip down the road to – er  - somewhere else, man.

David Cameron as he might look were he unfortunate enough to become a Methadrone addict

But the Professor killed his own credibility when he strayed into the twilight zone of policy. A couple of his colleagues joined him and nobody apart from the Guardian gave a monkeys, until last weekend somebody called Dr. Polly Taylor also walked the ACMD plank. Speaking on the radio from Amsterdam yesterday – where he was possibly researching the wonders of legalised hash bars (despite what he was saying, there aren’t many left and it’s a load of bollocks to say that drug use in Holland is any less seedy than in the UK) – Professor Nutt reprised his theme that cannabis/weed is less dangerous than alchohol, criminalising it drives the price up, policing it costs money and wastes resources etc. Heavy.

Of course it is, but it’s a different argument. There is a time for expediency, and in the case of Methedrone, aka Mephadrone/M-kat, the time is now. I’m not a user myself, you may be surprised to know, but living in the ballsachingly trendy Bethnal Green/Shoreditch/Hoxton triangle, I know plenty of people with direct experience  - probably more than Alan Johnson or the nutty professor combined – who state categorically that this stuff is very, very bad indeed. Unlike the government or the squabbling scientists I’m happy to hear their unvarnished opinion that Methadrone is more moreish than Ketamine, Amphetamine Sulphide or Cocaine, can quickly reduce kids to a ‘feral’ state and, whether legal or not, creates a burning habit which sucks away money, energy and self-respect. Bummer.

Alan Johnson, as he may appear to David Cameron in his hypothetical state as a Methadrone addict

It is regrettable that political correctness, as represented by Professor Nutt and his grateful-not-to-be-dead academic colleagues, has fetched up against political opportunism, as represented by Alan Johnson and his soon-to-be-dead-in-the-water authoritarian bastard squad. I almost certainly know more about drugs on a first hand level than most of the boneheads in government – not sure about the Tories, though – but surely here is a clear case for decisive legislation. Regardless as to whether it played a small, middling or large part in the recent deaths of three kids, Methadrone is far more dangerous and nasty than weed and hash – think crystal meth and crack cocaine. Criminalising it may well create an underground black market and drive up the price, but it’s facile to argue that notoriety will add to its popularity, since it’s all over the news that the stuff is legal and relatively cheap. Banning its import and resale will only hurt those who wish to go out of their way to use it, and will almost certainly deter recreational/casual/impressionable drug fashionistas. Result.

Ban Methadrone with immediate effect, not because it may or may not have the potential to kill, but because it sure as hell doesn’t do anyone any good. Nor is this a Human Rights issue. If it drives the price up, then boo hoo for the prats who want to use it. And let’s not confuse this with the cannabis/marijuana debate, policy which is in itself influenced by Britain’s costly role as the 51st state of the USA.This is too serious a debate for the chatterati, so while we’re at it, bollocks to the Guardian and the Daily Mail. The drones who write for those rags should get out more. End of.

John J Kelly

Meanwhile, the same UN who spent between USD 150 – 250 million arranging this wet fish in the face of democratic practice, fired Peter Galbraith for daring to suggest that the outcome would be flawed and endorsed Kai Eide, the Norwegian Blue Parrot at the head of the UNAMA license to steal, are lining up to line their pockets anew. Why did the UN (and EU) doggedly stick by the election process, despite all the evidence that this will take the country (even further) down into the depths of violence and authoritarian kleptocracy? Sources in Kabul point to a new round of contracts, estimated at USD 4 billion, for the 5000+ UN agencies and NGOs running around in big white trucks doing fuck all. Bookmark this and see if I’m right. I apologise in advance if no new money is voted, Ban Ki Moon kicks Kai Eide up the arse and the ‘international community’ threatens withdrawal and sanctions. But the awful hypocrisy of  a rush to congratulate to Karzai from puddinghead Gordon Brown, wanky Ban Ki and the increasingly Bushlike Peace Prize Laureate Barack Obama are as emetic as anything I’ve seen for a very long time.

None of this was worth a single dead soldier, much less thousands of dead Afghan civilians. By the way, the ‘bad guys’ are in Pakistan – now. Drone bombing villages is winning no hearts and minds there either.

And another thing: while the grim spectre of mass murderer by proxy Tony Blair becoming EU President recedes, the boat is floating for David Miliband to become EU High Representative. His only qualification, apart from being a Blairite, is undying loyalty to Hillary Clinton and the US. If that’s what we want – the United States of Europe – he’ll be perfect and the EU will be involved in full scale conflicts, wherever liberal intervention sounds like a good idea, before you can skin a banana.

John J Kelly

There are more twists in the tale of the Afghan elections than Hamid Karzai’s S shaped bed – not that I’d know, I hasten to add. What I do know is that donkeys laden with ballot boxes are finding their way back to Kabul to deliver the verdict that the international community needs – ‘don’t panic, democracy is flowering in Afghanistan.’ Well I reserve the right to panic. Another four soldiers died today, along with at least 30 civilians and 56 others wounded in Kandahar.

Here’s a suggestion for the Afghan election theme:

Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss . . .

We’ll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song

I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around me
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
And I’ll get on my knees and pray We don’t get fooled again. (The Who: Won’t get fooled again)

The only thing flowering is Poppy, and the chief gardener, who ‘borrowed’ $2 million interest free from the Ghazanfar Bank, (how and in what form will he make repayments?) has now seen his ‘massive lead’ whittled down to a ‘narrow lead’ over the man who spent the second biggest amount campaigning. To this extent, the Afghan campaign followed the ‘democratic’ model of the US – money talks. As I said several posts back, in lieu of a fair result, we might as well accept Karzai in preference to a prolonged period of even more violence and bloodcurdling carryings-on that might be generated in a runoff – but on the other hand, Abdullah has hinted that his supporters might get frisky if the ‘election is seen to be rigged’. Todays preliminary results (based on 10% of the votes cast, give Karzai 41% and Abdullah 39%, but do not include any votes from the south, where Karzai will win whatever votes the Taliban allowed to be cast. I’ve seen more convincing all-in wrestling bouts – in fact, a novel runoff might take the form of Karzai vs Abdullah, mano a mano, in the ring, wearing tights and masks, of course.

But let’s be serious for once. Thus has a brilliant idea (though I say so myself). Why not bring in Jeb Bush, Former Governor of Florida, to supervise and fine tune the election count? No-one could argue with that – after all, they didn’t in the 2000 US elections.

John J Kelly

Whilst acknowledging that Thus supports the Ghani campaign and allowing for the fact that ‘he would say that,’  we publish the Ghani camp complaints without comment and without vouching for the detail, which will no doubt be judged by the Election Complaints Commission. What it demonstrates is that this was neither a free nor a fair election, and the result should not be allowed to stand, at least not under the banner of democracy or any such other fantasy construct. Abdullah Abdullah’s statement today shows that he agrees, and from the look of this document, he’s in a perfect position to know. Here’s the list in full:

Election Fraud Complaints Filed to the ECC by Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai Campaign

John J. Kelly

The Free and Fair Elections Foundation of Afghanistan put 7000 monitors in the field and confirmed the BBC reports of widespread ballot box stuffing, fraud, bribery and corruption. Today a spokesman tantalisingly stated that it could hardly be deemed free and fair when ‘two candidates’ had extensively employed these tactics. Which two? Let’s hazard a wild guess. Hamid Karzai’s running mate is Muhammad Qasim Fahim, a Tajik warlord with less than democratic credentials, while his other Tajik ‘supporters’ include ex-General Abdul Rashid Dostum (Thus passim) and a crew of narco warlords, allegedly marshalled by his brother and ‘campaign manager’ Walid.  There are plenty of ‘suspects’ to be the ‘other’ overtly corrupt candidate, but since third place contender  Ashraf Ghani (Thus passim) is campaigning on the anti-corruption/anti warlord ticket, likewise fourth place Ramazan Bashardost, they are unlikely candidates. Theconfident demeanours of both Karzai and his leading challenger, Abdullah Abdullah (both declared themselves early victors) suggests  an inside track on the result. Now indeed, Abdullah himself is now saying that the polls were rigged. Another triumphant use of $250 million by the UN, I don’t think.

The election will probably go to a second round, since neither warlord will secure more than 50% of a turnout well below 50% of the population in the first place (free,fair?). Extreme factions of the Taliban did just enough tactical murdering and muttering to drastically reduce the turnout in the Pashtun South, but apathy did the rest. Many ethnic Pashtuns were sufficiently disillusioned with Karzai to sit on their hands rather than get them inky and liable to to chopped off – although the UN ‘incredible’ indelible ink turned out to be as wishy-washy as their election arrangements, thus allowing for multiple voting in areas outside the South where, for example, Abdullah’s faction held sway.

Despite avowals on the part of the two main challengers that they will encourage their supporters to refrain from violence during the runoff, it is entirely possible, and consistent with insurgency tactics, that the Taliban see this whole process as a bear trap which will expose the chimaera of democracy.  They will continue to apply sufficient pressure – a few spectaculars added to the regular intimidation outside the mosques, not dissimilar, in fact, to IRA tactics in Northern Ireland – to discredit the election process (not that they need to try too hard, given the provenance of the protagonists).

We need a hard, impartial look at the evidence of corruption, fraud, bribery, intimidation and the contacts and affilations of the ‘leading’ candidates. It’s ultimately up to the Afghani people as to whether they want these guys to govern them, but if we expect US, British and Canadian soldiers to continue to fight and die in the name of ‘democracy’ then we need to know what form it is taking.  The EU and UNAMA couldn’t monitor an episode of American Idol, never mind an election, so it’s no use asking for their opinion. But it’s pretty obvious that whatever this was, the election was neither free nor fair. Thus, no good will come of it. Mark my words.

John J Kelly

The Dearing Report, commissioned in 1996 under Tory PM ‘Sir’ John Major (who achieved only 3 O levels, didn’t go to university but won an election with the greatest margin in electoral history, published in 1997, recommended charging students 25% of their tuition costs. Newly-elected Labour ‘reluctantly’ introduced means-tested fees, claiming it as a Tory initiative. In 2003, a Labour-commissioned White Paper proposed that universities could charge students top-up tuition fees capped at £3000. In November of the same year, Tony Blair (educated free at St John’s College, Oxford) pontificated in the Queen’s Speech:

“A bill will be introduced to enable more young people to benefit from higher education. Up-front tuition fees will be abolished for all full-time students and a new Office For Fair Access will assist those from disadvantaged backgrounds. Universities will be placed on a sound financial footing.”

Professor Jugears, Chairman of the I'm Alright Jack Club

On the very same day, Norwich North MP Ian Gibson (yes, him Thus passim) tabled a motion on ‘top up fees’ signed by 185 MPs. Earlier that year, Tory Leader Iain Duncan Smith (Sandhurst, no university) pledged that Tories would abolish fees, to Labour claims (audacious even by the standards of spin at that time) that this would ‘disadvantage’ poorer students and cost 6500 academic jobs. On January 27, 2004, Education Secretary Charles Clarke (coincidentally MP for Norwich South  - educated free at King’s College, Cambridge) introduced the Higher Education Bill on the very same day as the Hutton Inquiry into circumstances surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly. Amid the muck and bullets, having bought off Labour rebels with last-minute concessions and support from right wing Tories, the bill was passed with a majority of only 5, the closest Blair came to defeat thus far. At a stroke, Professor Jugears and his cronies undermined the 1944 Butler Education Act, which had safeguarded the rights to a free education at primary, secondary and tertiary levels for 60 years. If they had tried the same trick on the NHS, another (rightful) sacred cow, there would have been bloodshed, but the bill was enacted on the premise that “Universities exist to enable the British economy and society to deal with the challenges posed by the increasingly rapid process of global change” (Charles Clarke).

Herein endeth the history lesson. As a product of the Butler Act – a poor kid lucky enough to get a great free education leading to Oxford, Manchester (and the school of hard knocks) – I despise the foul cant about ‘engineering social mobility’ belching from the arse of ‘five jobs’ Alan Milburn (Lancaster University), and the rest of his Blairite bastard squad, shameless elitist social climbers who have burnt the ladder behind them. It is an obscene insult to the intelligence to claim that career success in the professions is a direct result of the networks created at elite schools and universities. Of course it is, and always was. Blair’s clique was notoriously stacked with fellow lawyers, Oxbridge room mates, Scottish Public School kiltlifters, Trotskyite student union bores and a fat bloke who used to be a ship’s shop steward to appease the unions. Cameron’s Notting Hill Haw Haws reek of Eton, Oxbridge, Bristol. It’s debatable whether you could ever stop the tendency of elites to form, or whether it is ethical or even sensible to do so, but you certainly don’t go about it by erecting financial barriers to entry to higher education for ‘the less well-off.’ During Labour’s tenure, the percentage of middle class students has risen, as has the number of debt-burdened graduates.

The crisis in education funding is as much a product of the overweaning burden of administration, the 1992 (Tory) elevation of polytechnics to university status and the bewildering number of ‘new’ universities that nobody has heard of, whose qualifications are commensurately worthless but which increased the intake and number of academic posts. Bothering kids at primary and secondary level with endless tests, grade inflation, league tables burying teachers under mountains of target-inspired assessment programmes and whipping parents into a frenzy of fear that their kids will be ‘left behind’ are unforgivable and premeditated crimes of social engineering. Give us back our Butler Act, you lying hypocrites. And stop sniggering, Cameron. We hear you’re thinking of privatising state secondary schools. Have you learned nothing? What kind of education did you have, boy? Oh, Eton and Oxbridge.

John J Kelly

The historic Naz Foundation petition to the Delhi High Court actually began with a history lesson – of fetishism, perversion, fondling and fornication and the punishments thereof. Tellingly, the Christian and European side of the history is much more severe and restrictive than the Hindu Indian one. It only takes a visit to India’s most notorious temple to see that there is a history here of open discussion of sex. Section 377 of the 1860 Indian Penal Code, which criminalises “carnal relations against the natural order” is based on the English Sodomy Law. The embedded notion – sex is for procreation only and that other sex is “unnatural” -is very much a Judeo-Christian idea which still hold sway in Bible Belt America (cf Pro Life) and in the pronouncements of the current Pope and in several sects of Islam (itself Judeo-Christian) but is not a feature of mainstream Buddhism or Hinduism. This idea held sway in the early applications of the law, but quickly gave way to India’s need to control its population.

Some in India claim that gays are a decadent western import. India's ladyboys walk on the wild side - now they can do so legally. Will it make a fundamental difference to how society views its others?

The Delhi High Court Decision to exempt mutually consenting adults from section 377 is a major shift which has been compared to the Roe vs Wade case in America, where women won the right to choose an abortion. At the same time the ruling has opened the debate as to whether the civil rights process itself is an aspect of Westernisation. Extremists even argue that somehow homosexuality, and by definition, tolerance, is alien and that civil rights for minorities is an invasive, exotic way of thinking.

Those radicals who argue against the corrupting aspects of western notions such as democracy avail themselves of the internet, that most democratic of outside influences, to illustrate and promulgate their views. The paradox is vividly apparent in the case of Iraq and Iran. While the web gives activists in India an opportunity to pool intellectual resources and raise their game to the point where they often make a fool of the government – see the varying quality of the 377 case documents, this version of events does little to explain the particular history of the laws being fought. This applies not just for gay rights and sexuality, but equally to Forest Law. These were drafted around the same time, but in this case importing the commercial interests of the British Raj, with the conservation of forests predicated on the need for massive Timber extraction. In 2006, in a similar way, this legal regime was challenged, and ownership rights of India’s “original people” were re-asserted after more than130 years.

It is sad that 60 years after Independence, these relics of British rule still remain, but it is also joyous to see that India has the resources and will to remake itself, and to do so with dignity. Both the Gay and Forest Rights campaigns focused around the notion of human dignity, something central to the Gandhian ideal and the wave of decolonisation it triggered. To call this a western ideal is to ignore the History of Others - others who were also capable of understanding the value of human life. These values, asserted in the Indian Constitution, are now taking precedence over a painful legal legacy. Thus these legal changes are signs not of the dominance of western values, but of a growing sense of inner confidence and self-ownership.